Solid Ground

It is tragic when I read the words of friends and family who take verses and rip them out of context to suit their ends.  This is the reason that I am in seminary: to add the weight of respect of letters among men to the explanation of the Word so that some men might actually hear.  Today’s passage is from John 14, the first part.

            “Let not your hearts be troubled. Believe in God; believe also in me. In my Father's house are many rooms. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am you may be also. And you know the way to where I am going.” Thomas said to him, “Lord, we do not know where you are going. How can we know the way?” Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. If you had known me, you would have known my Father also. From now on you do know him and have seen him.”

            Philip said to him, “Lord, show us the Father, and it is enough for us.” Jesus said to him, “Have I been with you so long, and you still do not know me, Philip? Whoever has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, ‘Show us the Father’? Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me? The words that I say to you I do not speak on my own authority, but the Father who dwells in me does his works. Believe me that I am in the Father and the Father is in me, or else believe on account of the works themselves.

            “Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever believes in me will also do the works that I do; and greater works than these will he do, because I am going to the Father. Whatever you ask in my name, this I will do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son. If you ask me anything in my name, I will do it.” (John 14:1-14 ESV)

I saw today, tragically, from some whom I love, the typical “name it, claim it” abuse of verses 12-14.  Let us look at this 14^th chapter of John with some perspective and see if we can shed some light on the various parts.

First, and most importantly, Jesus is talking to his disciples, men who are following him and yet do not understand at this point of the story why it is that Jesus has come, nor what he is doing.  Jesus has just told Peter that Peter will deny Jesus.  We have the benefit of hindsight, but we should not lose touch with the context.  This chapter is so incredibly dense, that I will have to keep focus on the verse in question, but always in the context of this first statement: Jesus is talking to his remaining eleven disciples.

Starting with the first verse, we run into our first question on translation.  Is the phrase Believe in God or You believe in God?  So, if Jesus has just informed Peter and the other apostles of Peter’s denial, then when he says to Believe in God, there is a context of denial.  This is an imperative, yes; but it is in the context of speaking to a group who clearly do believe in God.  So why should Jesus use this imperative? 

This chapter is one of the sentinel Trinitarian passages in the Bible.  In this first section, Jesus lays out His own unity with and yet separate person from God.  In the second section, Jesus will lay out His unity with and yet separate person from the Holy Spirit.  But let’s not get ahead of ourselves.  Let’s continue.

Jesus sets up Thomas by saying “…And you know the way to where I am going.” Realize that Jesus has just described metaphorically heaven and yet Thomas, who is just not seeing the point of all of this says.  “We don’t know where you are going.  How can we know the way?”

This is vitally important point.  Even one of the eleven remaining disciples did not know the way, did not know the goal, did not know the purpose of Jesus and His coming into the world, and the manner of His leaving the world.  Is it any wonder that we today have such a perverted view of Jesus and His life and ministry?  What were the Jews expecting?  What did they get instead?  This dichotomy of expectation and realization is part of the backdrop of Christianity both then and now.  What do we expect and what has actually been realized?

We all know the famous quote of John 14:6.  If you don’t, I’m sorry, but we’ll have to come back to that another day.  Let us look for now at John 14:7: “If you had known me, you would have known my Father also. From now on you do know him and have seen him.” This is a remarkable statement.  He is accusing His disciples of not knowing Him!  Look at His audience here: the eleven remaining disciples!  If you had known me….  Why does he say this?  Remember what we keep saying, context, context, context.  This is about Jesus making the claim, over and over again, until He gets it through their thick skulls, that He is from God, He is of God, He is God.

Now comes the big set up for our quoted passage for today.  Philip requests that Jesus “show us the Father, and it is enough.” Now, look how this follows on the heels of what Jesus has just said!  You have to love the humanity of the Apostles.  They have the Real Deal, Jesus Himself, in flesh and blood, standing (or sitting) with them, and they still have ears filled with wax, minds full of worldly clutter, totally incapable of hearing the message right in front of them.  It is truly remarkable.  Types and shadows, my friends, types and shadows.  To the ears of the nonbeliever, all this is foolishness.  But to the ears of the believer, these are the Words of Salvation.  Look at these words Jesus spoke to the scribes and Pharisees back in John 8:

"But because I tell the truth, you do not believe me. Which one of you convicts me of sin? If I tell the truth, why do you not believe me? Whoever is of God hears the words of God. The reason why you do not hear them is that you are not of God.” (John 8:45-47 ESV)

Is Jesus comparing His own eleven to the scribes and Pharisees?  In a very real sense, yes, He is.  We are all condemned to death under Adam.  It is not until Jesus arises from the dead, overcoming death and sin, that any one of them gets it!  If the Apostles don’t get it despite seeing with their eyes and hearing with their ears, how are we to do so?  That is the role of the Holy Spirit, and we are coming to that shortly.

So, what is Jesus’ response to Philip? First, His response is almost incredulous. “How can you say, ‘Show us the Father’?” Really, Philip?  Aren’t you listening?  “Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in Me?” Really Philip?  Now, one more time in small words, Philip, and the rest of you, so that you will all understand me plainly. “The words that I say to you I do not speak on my own authority, but the Father who dwells in me does His works.  Believe me that I am in the Father and the Father is in me, or else believe on account of the works themselves.”

One aside, the word works in this contexts means not just signs and wonders, miracles and healing, and all of the great stuff Jesus does, but much more importantly, all of the teaching that He has done, all of the re-examination of scripture that He has done (and notably will do shortly after His resurrection.) The words that I say to you....  The point of this statement is not the works, the point is to believe that Jesus is in the Father and the Father is in Jesus.

And now, finally, we are ready for our verses for the day, John 14:12-14.  

“Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever believes in me will also do the works that I do; and greater works than these will he do, because I am going to the Father. Whatever you ask in my name, this I will do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son. If you ask me anything in my name, I will do it." (John 14:12-14 ESV)

Look, you lot, you are the believers.  It’s all going to be on your back, because I have to leave very soon.  You will have to do works, greater works than what I have done.  Now, here, it is very important to look at that word works again in this context.  Clearly, Jesus doesn’t mean that they will have to duplicate what He Himself is about to in terms of the resurrection.  That much I think we can state as a given.  So, there are limits to the scope of these works.  What is the point of the works?  To demonstrate that the Father is in Jesus and Jesus is in the Father.  Does that mean signs and wonders and miracles?  Sure, we know that it does.  What is the purpose of these signs and wonders and miracles and are they all of what the apostles need to be doing?  Works, importantly, specifically and most prominently means to teach, to spread the Word.  How do we know this?  That’s what Jesus will follow through with in the next section.  If the apostles have to do great works, they are going to need a Helper.  And Jesus will define the Work of the Helper.

But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, he will teach you all things and bring to your remembrance all that I have said to you. (John 14:26 ESV)

Ah, so remembering and repeating the Words of Jesus is a big time Work.  Whatever you, the eleven remaining apostles, ask in My name, this is will do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son.  Please, please, please, read that highlighted portion again and again.  I know that you will want to highlight the next line, because that is what our fallen minds seek.  We want to name it and claim it.  But it is not about us, it never has been. It’s all about Jesus, and the Father, and the Holy Spirit.

That’s enough for today.  Go to church, one in which the Word of God is preached from the Bible, in an expository manner, explaining the Word in light of the unfolding mystery of redemptive history, in light of the Word made flesh, Jesus Christ our only mediator and advocate.

– Troll –

To my Pentecostal Brothers and Sisters, part 2

Before we push on into more of the scripture, I left a lot of dangling questions in the last post.  Let’s clean up a couple of those first.  I made an assertion that our health, wealth and happiness was not, and should not be, our greatest concern.  In point of fact, we hear constantly in our churches today that God wants us to be healthy, wealthy and happy, in a word, prosperous.  I know where these ideas originate.  They come from the Old Covenant discussion of blessings and curses.  They start with the idea that we can uphold the Law and obtain the blessings of those covenants.  I want to begin this post by imploding that argument.

First of all, are you ethnically Jewish?  If you answered yes, then I have some bad news for you. You have already broken the covenants.  Only two covenants were made unilaterally (arguably the Noahide as well, but that is another conversation,) and those are the Abrahamic and Davidic covenants.  The creation covenant and the Mosaic covenants were broken by the Jews.  They were conditional covenants.  If you put your faith in the Law, how are you going to claim the rewards when you have already broken the deal?  You didn’t break the deal?  Show me the Temple.  Yes, right now.  Show me the Temple.  You broke the deal.  Do you expect that you will not die?  You broke the deal.

Now, the rest of you who answered no, I’ve got some bad news for you.  The Mosaic covenant was not for you.  You were not given any of the promises made to Moses.  Even if you think you have kept Mosaic Law (Messianic Jews, who are not really Jews at all,) you haven’t really kept the Law, and it’s not your deal anyway, so let it go.  I find it absolutely astounding that preachers can tell people that they can have this and that based upon Old Covenant promises that had nothing to do with us Gentiles.  Those promises were not about us.

The arguments of Paul, in Romans 4 in particular, explain to us how the Abrahamic Covenant and then the Davidic Covenant are about us gentiles.  The fact that God made His promise to Abraham before he was circumcised allowed all of humanity access to this covenant.  Faith in the promise is the key.  That is how gentiles have access to Salvation.  Read all of Romans again.  You can do just chapters 3 and 4 for now, for time concerns, but read the whole letter.  Read it straight through, or use my link so that you can listen to it being read to you.  Each argument builds logically on the one before.  Paul anticipates your objections and deals with them as they arise.  It is amazing stuff.

The second point is that the Law offers no hope of salvation.  What I am I saying?  The Law teaches us that we need salvation.  It offers no solution to the problem.  How do we know this?  Jesus pounds on the Pharisees over this issue throughout all four Gospels.  Paul picks it up and says this in Romans 7:

What then shall we say? That the law is sin? By no means! Yet if it had not been for the law, I would not have known sin. For I would not have known what it is to covet if the law had not said, “You shall not covet.”

Paul returns to this topic over and over, but see what he says in Philippians 3:

For we are the circumcision, who worship by the Spirit of God and glory in Christ Jesus and put no confidence in the flesh—though I myself have reason for confidence in the flesh also. If anyone else thinks he has reason for confidence in the flesh, I have more: circumcised on the eighth day, of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews; as to the law, a Pharisee; as to zeal, a persecutor of the church; as to righteousness under the law, blameless. But whatever gain I had, I counted as loss for the sake of Christ. Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ…. (Philippians 3:3-8)

So, Paul recognizes that he has no hope through the Law, that his only hope is by the atoning work of Christ Jesus.

But finally, for his first point, let me be more direct.  Read these passages from Matthew 4:1-11 and Luke 4:1-13.  This is the account of the temptation of Jesus.  Now compare this with Genesis 3.         

But the serpent said to the woman, “You will not surely die. For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.” (Genesis 3:4-5 ESV)

What does Satan offer Jesus?  He offers him food.  He offers him health.  He offers him power.  Satan offers Jesus health, wealth and prosperity.  Hmmm.  Wait a second.  If Satan offers Jesus health, wealth and prosperity, and Jesus says an unhesitating NO to him, what are we to make of the prosperity gospel?  Should we think that our health, wealth and happiness are at the center of God’s concerns for us?  Really?  Let’s try this next passage from 2 Timothy.

But understand this, that in the last days there will come times of difficulty. For people will be lovers of self, lovers of money, proud, arrogant, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, heartless, unappeasable, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not loving good, treacherous, reckless, swollen with conceit, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, having the appearance of godliness, but denying its power. Avoid such people.

For the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions, and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander off into myths. As for you, always be sober-minded, endure suffering, do the work of an evangelist, fulfill your ministry.  (2 Timothy 3:1-5, 4:3-5 ESV)

Paul warns Timothy that in the last days, there will come times in which people will be lovers of self, of money and so on.  They will accumulate teachers to suit their own passions.  Health, wealth and prosperity.  I ask you again, does this fit together logically?

Today, an almost angry senior Pastor mentioned a key verse, then he paraphrased it badly.  This is the trick.  Instead of teaching the doctrine from the text, use the text to teach your message.  These are not the same thing.  The verse was Romans 12:2, and I have quoted it often.  R.C. Sproul considers this verse one of the most important in his ministry.

Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.

OK, then, I ask you again.  What does your transformed mind think of the arguments that have been put forth before you above?  Do you still think that health, wealth and prosperity are what living the Christian life is all about?  I will answer that question at the end of the series.  It is the crux of the problem and needs to be addressed.  But for now, let’s hit some other of the questions from the last post.

Repentance.  What is it?  Literally, it is to turn away from something, in our case sin.  Is it possible for us to stop sinning?  No.  Is it possible for us to rid ourselves of the condition of sin?  No.  We have already established that we are powerless against sin.  So, what is repentance?  Look at the Pharisees.  They believed that they fulfilled the Law.  They believed that they were righteous under the Law.  Repentance is nothing more, and nothing less, than a change of attitude towards our condition of sin.  As soon as we recognize that we are condemned under the Law from our condition of sin as well as our specific sins, then we have repented.  We have understood the problem and that we are powerless to fix it.  Repentance in reformed doctrine does not occur without the intervention of the Holy Spirit, but we will come back to that later.  For now, repentance is to stop looking to ourselves for our salvation, and to look outside of ourselves to God.  Is repentance necessary for salvation?  Of course, it is.  For as long as we look to ourselves and not outside of ourselves for salvation, we will never attain it.

And finally for today, let us discuss prophesy.  The common usage of this word is that this is to predict.  Because we have invested so much in this definition, we often lose track of the fact that, scripturally, it has at least two other definitions, both of which come into play in the Bible.  The first is to speak as if divinely inspired.  The second is to instruct or explain.  Let’s look at a typical prophet and see if these definitions all fit.  Isaiah is a typical prophet.  Some would say that Isaiah is the prophet.  Is everything that Isaiah says a prediction of the future?  Absolutely not!  Isaiah spends the vast majority of his book explaining what has already taken place in terms of the Old Covenants.  He is instructing and he is speaking through divine inspiration.  So, when a pastor stands in the pulpit and explains to you about why abortion is evil based upon scripture, citing the text and making a sound argument, that is prophesy.  Here is the key point to make on prophesy.  Go back to our three tools from the beginning and put them to the test.  Those rules must always apply.

Prophesy and rule 1.  It’s not about you, it’s not about me, it’s about Jesus.  But wait, Jesus is not mentioned in the whole book of Isaiah.  In fact, Jesus is not mentioned by name in the whole Old Testament.  Come, come.  We all know better than this.  Every time that a messianic passage is uttered, that is clearly about Jesus.  But, I want to take this a step farther. The Bible is about the greatest rescue mission of all time.  Here are the highlights: Creation, the Fall, the Law, the end of the Temple and the Diaspora, the Second Temple, the First Coming, the Life of Jesus, the sacrificial death of Jesus, the Arisen Jesus, the Ascension, the present evil age with the age to come breaking through, the Second Coming and Judgment.  That is the Bible narrative.  That is called Redemptive History.  The central figure in Redemptive History is Jesus.  That is why we can say that every word of the Bible is about Jesus.  Every word of the Bible has a redemptive historical context; therefore, we can talk about how every word of the Bible relates to Jesus in either past, present or future redemptive historical context.  Therefore, we can say that the whole book of Isaiah is about Jesus.  In fact, as Christians, we know that this is true.

Prophesy and rule 2.  The Bible never contradicts itself.  I would love to spend pages talking about Isaiah and its relationship to the New Testament.  In fact, three months ago, I did just that.  I looked very briefly and superficially at Isaiah 59 in relation to Romans 3.  In fact, the same themes are repeated throughout the Bible.  They have to be repeated because we stubbornly cling to our idolatry of self! (See rule 1.) Therefore, if there is prophesy, meaning divinely inspired instruction just as much as prediction, then it cannot contradict any other passage of the Bible.  Is there prophesy of both types in the New Testament?  Absolutely!  Paul is the most prolific of the New Testament prophets, but Jesus is clearly a prophet.  We look at the three offices of Jesus to be Prophet, Priest and King.  Not only does Jesus tell us the future, but He spends His entire earthly ministry instructing and explaining.  Jesus one ups the idea of divine inspiration; He clearly is an example of divine expiration, the breathed Word of God.  And so we will see in coming posts that rule 2 is never violated by prophesy.

One last point about rule 2, prophesy never violates rule 2 because prophesy always follows rule 1.  If prophesy is always about Jesus, if prophesy is always about redemptive history, then we can test its validity.  Prophesy is not about you and me, as much as we would like for it to be.  Prophesy must always instruct us concerning Jesus and redemptive history. Remember that there are parts of redemptive history that have not yet come to pass.  I am not excluding the future element of prophesy.  Still, prophesy will always instruct and discuss Jesus and redemptive history.

Prophesy and rule 3.   Starting in Matthew 4, Jesus starts to apply Old Testament verses to himself.  In Matthew 5, Jesus behaves as if He is the one in authority to dispense blessings and curses, i.e. God.  The whole of Jesus’ earthly ministry is explaining, first, how He fulfills all of the predictive elements of prophesy, and then, second, how He will continue in redemptive history to fulfill the salvation of the elect.  Instruction, education, always about Jesus, always about Himself.

That was my soapbox moment for today.  Relating this back to the Holy Spirit, if we believe as Christians in a triune God, that the Father, Son and Holy Ghost, are Three in One, of one substance, and the Father and Son always speak and teach in terms of redemptive history, (they do always speak that way, we can do that exercise if necessary,) then what is the topic of the Holy Spirit in this present evil age?  What does the Holy Spirit do?  Go back to the first post and focus on John 16.  The Holy Spirit will always follow the same rules that God and Jesus follow, always.

One final note.  Some would say that I am putting God in a box.  Some would say that I am putting rules on God, which cannot be done.  My response is this.  The Bible makes those rules about itself.  Understanding that is the beginning of repentance.

--Ogre--

What is Spiritual?

As I become a better student of Paul, I have found myself accused of not believing in anything spiritual.  Ironically, that is the same accusation that many liberals have leveled against Paul.  The reformers, on the other hand, viewed Paul as the Apostle of the Holy Spirit.  Therefore, l thought it would be helpful to look at why I consider myself spiritual.

I believe in the Trinity.  That is surely a good start.  The third person of the Trinity is the Holy Spirit.  We’ve discussed what the Holy Spirit does in the past, but for the sake of review, John 14-16, 20 are all good red letter sources on the Holy Spirit.  The Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son, testifies about the Son, and fills the disciples so that they may testify about the Son.  That is Who the Holy Spirit is and what He does.  The Holy Spirit brings true faith to the believers.  The Holy Spirit is the key to unlocking Salvation through the propitiating life, death and resurrection of Jesus.  That is a very spiritual doctrine.

Secondly, I believe that man has a spirit, a soul, a part of his existence that is completely tied to his body, and at the same time can be separated from his body.  In a way, Salvation is the eternal union of body and soul.  Without the Salvation through Jesus Christ (full formula implied,) the body will die and the soul will burn.  With Christ, first the soul is saved and then later the body is saved and reunited with the soul.  That is Biblical and that is a very spiritual doctrine.

What I don’t believe is any idea of Gnosticism or Mysticism that rips the Holy Spirit from the Trinity and has Him performing parlour tricks at the whim of man.  These ideas have been considered heretical since the first century.  The word-faith, name-it-claim-it groups do such tremendous violence to the Gospel that it is not recognizable as Gospel and constitutes heresy and false teaching in every sense of the phrase.  Paul warns constantly about false teachers, but here is what he says to the Corinthians on the subject.  This is a fairly stern warning.  Their end will correspond to their deeds.  This is a Law statement and it is true of all people at Judgment Day.  The difference is that the true Gospel gives access to a different righteousness that is external to us and given to true believers apart from any perceived merits on our part and regardless of any perceived faults on our part.  This is what Paul says in Romans 3-5 concerning justification.

Therefore, am I spiritual?  Absolutely, I am among the most spiritual people you know.  Am I a mystic?  Certainly not.  Am I a Gnostic?  Clearly not.  There is a type of spirituality apart from the magical realm of the mystic that resides within many faiths.  In Christianity, it is clearly defined in scripture.  Remember why we are not all Roman Catholics today.  Sola Scriptura is not such a bad thing, after all.

--Ogre--

Heidelberg Catechism: The Second Part--Of God the Father

This particular group is low on prose and high on referenced passages.  The catechism basically is letting the Bible say all we need about God the Father, and there is a lot of it.  As usual, the references are grouped together for easy clicking, even if the citations are far longer than prior sections.

Of God The Father

9. Lord's Day

Question 26. What do you believe when you say, "I believe in God the Father, Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth"?

Answer: That the eternal Father of our Lord Jesus Christ (who of nothing made heaven and earth, with all that is in them; (Genesis 1, 2; Exodus 20:11, Job 33:4; Job 38, 39; Psalms.33:6; Acts 2:24, 14:15; Isaiah 45:7) who likewise upholds and governs the same by his eternal counsel and providence) (Matthew 10:29, Hebrews 1:3, Psalms 104:27-30, 115:3; Matthew 10:29, Ephesians 1:11) is for the sake of Christ his Son, my God and my Father; (John 1:12, Romans 8:15, Galatians 4:5-7, Ephesians 1:5) on whom I rely so entirely, that I have no doubt, but he will provide me with all things necessary for soul and body (Psalms 55:23, Matthew 6:25-26, Luke 12:22) and further, that he will make whatever evils he sends upon me, in this valley of tears turn out to my advantage; (Romans 8:28) for he is able to do it, being Almighty God, (Romans 10:12, Luke 12:22, Romans 8:23, Isaiah 46:4, Romans 10:12) and willing, being a faithful Father. (Matthew 6:25-34, 7:9-11)

Isaiah 45:7 is quite interesting and worth a discussion.  The ESV records this verse as I form light and create darkness, I make well-being and create calamity, I am the Lord, who does all these things.  Interestingly enough, the Heidelberg references this translation of that passage:  I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I the LORD do all these things.  When I discuss Hell this week, I’ll be sure to include this passage, as it is one of those that just sticks in the craw. 

Also, if there are duplications of passages, particularly at each end of a section of citations, this was by design in the catechism.  I did not add these of my own accord.

10. Lord's Day

Question 27. What do you mean by the providence of God?

Answer: The almighty and everywhere present power of God; (Acts 17:25-28, Jeremiah 23:23-24, Isaiah 29:15-16, Ezekiel 8:12) whereby, as it were by his hand, he upholds and governs (Hebrews 1:3) heaven, earth, and all creatures; so that herbs and grass, rain and drought, (Jeremiah 5:24, Acts 14:17) fruitful and barren years, meat and drink, health and sickness, (John 9:3) riches and poverty, (Proverbs 22:2) yea, and all things come, not by chance, but be his fatherly hand. (Matthew 10:20, Proverbs 16:33)

Question 28. What advantage is it to us to know that God has created, and by his providence does still uphold all things?

Answer: That we may be patient in adversity; (Romans 5:3, James 1:3, Psalms 39:9, Job 1:21-22) thankful in prosperity; (Deuteronomy 8:10; 1 Thessalonians 5:18) and that in all things, which may hereafter befall us, we place our firm trust in our faithful God and Father, (Psalms 55:22, Romans 5:4) that nothing shall separate us from his love; (Romans 8:38-39) since all creatures are so in his hand, that without his will they cannot so much as move. (Job 1:12, 2:6, Acts 17:28, 25, Proverbs 21:1)

The next section is on Jesus, the Son.  As you may expect, it is by far the longest section; therefore, it will be broken into a few pieces for better consumption.

--Troll--

The ThirtyNine Articles: 1-5, the Trinity

The first five articles have to do with the Trinity.  They are direct historical refuting of the Arian heresy.  Article 3 is the most interesting on its own merit, and one to which I will take a contrary position.  But these 5 articles make a good start to the discussion.

I. Of faith in the holy Trinity.

There is but one living and true God, everlasting, without body, parts, or passions; of infinite power, wisdom, and goodness; the maker and preserver of all things both visible and invisible. And in unity of this Godhead there are three persons, of one substance, power, and eternity: the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost.

The first half seems straightforward on its surface.  But there is the common error of assuming that the one living and true God is the Father.  This is clearly NOT what is being said here.  The one true God is the Triune God, the Godhead being the Three in One.  The issue of one substance is very important and relates to the issue of Perichoresis that was discussed a couple of posts ago.  The main issue is that when we speak of One God, we are speaking of the Triune God, not specifically the Father unless the context of the passage in question demands such of the term.  This idea is of particular interest when applied to the Old Testament.  Often Christians will forget that Jesus, as Wholly God, was present and participated in all that transpired in that era of redemptive history.  He was, is and every will be fully God and fully part of the Trinity.

II. Of the word or son of God which was made very man.

The Son, which is the Word of the Father, begotten from everlasting of the Father, the very and eternal GOD, of one substance with the father; He took man’s nature in the womb of the blessed Virgin, of her substance; so that two whole and perfect natures, that is to say the Godhead and manhood, were joined together in one person, never to be divided, whereof is one Christ, very GOD and very man, who truly suffered, was crucified, died, and was buried, to reconcile his father to us, and to be a sacrifice, not only for original guilt, but also for all actual sins of men.

Right out of the gate, we are simultaneously at Genesis 1:1 and at John 1:1.  This section deals with the idea of hypostatic union, wherein Jesus is both fully God and fully man.  The importance of Jesus being born into mankind as an infant is sometimes lost.  By entering the world as an infant, Jesus became fully man, in all parts as man.  There is no part of the experience and reality that is to be human that Jesus missed.  Therefore, Jesus is able to be a completely sufficient sacrifice for man that redeems all parts of humanity.  It cannot be said that man’s will, or man’s childhood, or any part of the life of man, or of his being, is excluded from the sufficiency of Christ.  This is a huge point.  That is what is meant by the two whole and perfect natures.  Perfect means both that Jesus was perfect in His human nature, but also that Jesus was perfectly whole in His human nature.  Simultaneously, He was Wholly and Perfectly God.

The last portion talks about the atonement.  Notice that both parts of the propitiating atonement are specifically mentioned.  Never should an Anglican church that holds to these articles edit from the scripture the word propitiation.  The purpose of the resurrection was to reconcile His Father to us.  That idea is huge.  Jesus causes His Father to be reconciled to us.  Without a full understanding of original sin, perhaps the depth of that problem is not obvious.  Luckily, the 39 Articles will go into original sin later.  In addition to reconciliation, the resurrection is a sacrifice, not only for original guilt or original sin, but also for all actual sins of men.  This statement declares that we believe in the complete sufficiency of the resurrection for all sin.  Another absolutely huge doctrinal statement comes forth right out of the gate.  Although article 2 does not state it here explicitly, this is the idea of the perfect and sufficient sacrifice that is discussed elsewhere.

III. Of the going down of Christ into hell.

As Christ died for us, and was buried: so also it is to be believed that he went down into hell.

Here we will have to say that there is much disagreement.  Many Christians do actually believe the second half of this statement.  I, along with many of the reformed, do not agree that Christ ever entered Hell.  The idea that Christ would enter Hell does great damage to Christian theology, is unnecessary according to the scripture, and is counterintuitive.  Let’s go through the applicable passages of the Gospels.

Here are the passages from Matthew, Mark, Luke and John.  There is no mention of hell.  In fact, the comments made by Jesus repeatedly talk of death, but there is never talk of Hell.  The sign of Jonah that Jesus mentions is that like Jonah spent three days in the belly of the whale, He would spend three days in the belly of the earth.  But this is not Hell.  In any passage of the New Testament that deals with Hell, the reference to Jesus is always in terms of the One who passages judgment.  There is never a mention of His actually having gone there.

The descent that is discussed in the Nicene Creed is a descent or condescension of Jesus as God to become wholly man.  This descent is not required in any formation of theology to require His further descent into Hell.  The other two creeds, the Apostles and Athanasian Creeds, do specifically mention a descent into hell.  This point has been discussed in great detail over the centuries,

Calvin in his Institutes did specifically argue for the descent of Christ into Hell.  It is interesting that his arguments are actually from the creeds as opposed to from the scripture.  In this most unlike Calvin moment, he veers from his position of Sola Scriptura arguing a very Catholic argument that because it appears in some of the creeds, the word hell is an elaboration or explanation of the word death.  Theologically, not only is this not necessary, but I agree with others that this is counterintuitive. 

Calvin further argues that Christ’s descent into hell is required to fulfill the complete redemption of mankind.  Not only is this incorrect, this is a good springboard to a better conclusion.  The wage of sin is death to be sure, and all men will pay this price ultimately.  But this does not require that all men descend into hell in order to receive salvation.  On the contrary, as Christ was the Firstborn of the New Covenant in the Age to come, so too was he also not condemned to Hell.  He entered death and was resurrected, saving Himself and all whom He would elect from Hell into everlasting life.  Therefore, as we do not enter into Hell as believers, and because we follow Christ, not only figuratively, but quite literally, we should not expect that Jesus ever entered Hell.  We should, in fact, believe that Jesus’ victory over death was to deny Hell, not only of Himself, but also all of His elect.

IV. Of the Resurrection of Christ.

Christ did truly arise again from death, and took again his body, with flesh, bones, and all things appertaining to the perfection of man’s nature, wherewith he ascended into heaven, and there sits, until he returns to judge all men at the last day.

We clearly get a glimpse at Christ’s resurrected body and its nature as citizen of the Age to Come.  Jesus sits down in the upper chamber with His Apostles and He eats food.  But while we believe that this is a real and resurrected Body, there are just as clearly aspects of this Body that are not human in nature.  We can begin with Its victory over death, a feat never accomplished by another human body.  Can we call the resurrected body of perfected humanity that we will inherit on the last day equivalent to this Body of Jesus revealed to the Apostles?  That, I believe is what is meant in this passage.

V. Of the Holy Ghost.

The Holy Ghost, proceeding from the father and the son, is of one substance, majesty, and glory, with the father and the son, very and eternal God.

Perichoresis and the relationship between the parts of the Trinity is exactly what is being described in this article.  Just as Jesus is One with the Father, the Holy Spirit is One with both the Father and the Son.  While each is distinct in their roles in redemptive history, each is of the same essence with the others.  We should never expect One person of the Trinity to act in a way that contradicts one of the other parts.  That would be to act in opposition to one’s self.  That idea would surely contradict our conception of the perfection and Holiness of God.

In the next post, I will discuss articles 6 and 7 concerning scripture, before returning to the Creeds.

--Troll--

Building Blocks: Trinity: word study

I was speaking with my priest and friend about the Trinity last week, and the issue of the third person of the Trinity became the topic. (Yes, such conversations do happen in the real world, and yes, this really did happen.) And so, he says that I should look up the word perichoresis, a concept that he feels describes the Biblical view of the church of the Trinity.  The concept of the Trinity is Biblical, is confirmed by the First Ecumenical Council in Nicaea in the third century, so that all Roman Catholics, Orthodox, Protestants and Reformed will agree with the concept.  Perichoresis is developed more fully in the early eighth century, in an attempt to better describe the interactions of the persons of the Trinity with each other.  Of course, there will be the theological children of Kant, Kierkegaard, Finney and Wesley with which to contend, but the historical church at least can get behind this doctrine.  And so, I looked it up.

Perichoresis is a word that describes the relationship between the three parts of the Trinity.  If we start from its opposite, that is much easier to understand, and then turn that on its head, we will get to this concept.  We need first to define some terms.  The first term is ousias, which is Greek and means natural essence.  In Jesus we have a person who is of two essences, both fully human and fully God.  This concept of two essences in one person is called hypostatic union.  Another related term is co-inherence, where two essences coinhere in the one person of Christ.

Now, for the reverse, if there is one essence called God, then He exists as three persons: the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.  The word perichoresis is literally a cleaving together, so that the three are cleaved together as one.  Since each is of the same substance or same essence as the other two, they would be expected to act in concordance with each other, which is what scripture suggests.

John 17 starts to unfold this relationship of the Father and Son for us in Jesus’ prayer for His elect.  21 …that they may all be one, just as you, Father, are in me, and I in you, that they also may be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me. 22 The glory that you have given me I have given to them, that they may be one even as we are one, 23 I in them and you in me, that they may become perfectly one, so that the world may know that you sent me and loved them even as you loved me.  In this passage, we have the Father and Son in each other, and Jesus prays to incorporate His elect into this relationship. 

Moving to Matthew 28:19, the Great Commission, we are to go forth and Baptize in the name of the Trinity.  Jesus uses the phrase “in the name of” which is an Old Testament phrase that invokes God.  By listing all three together, Jesus is saying that all three parts of the Trinity are God.  In the same way that the Old Testament views God as a single person, the fullness of the Trinity is revealed by Jesus in the New Covenant.  The name of God is a big deal to Old Testament Jews.  Jesus invokes this name of God concept to include Himself and the Holy Spirit.  This would have been just incredible to hear for the first time as first century Jews.

What does Jesus say about this third part of the Trinity?  Let’s go again to John 16.  Jesus must leave so that the third person of the Trinity can come.  And when He comes, His role will be to convict the world concerning sin and righteousness and judgment.  Why would this be the concern of the Holy Spirit?  The answer is the theme of the whole Bible.  God is concerned with the reconciliation of man to Himself.  God is a just God whose just wrath for our sin must be satisfied; therefore, He has to send a part of Himself to fulfill the Law and be the perfect sacrifice.  Finally, He has to send another part of Himself to make sure we understand what has just happened on our behalf and gather those elect to Himself. 

Therefore, the word perichoresis describes the relationship of the Father and the Son as an intertwining and cleaving together of their persons with the Holy Spirit enveloping both, infusing both and interacting with both, because the Holy Spirit is of the same essence as both.

One last word to discuss today is paraclete.  Paraclete is another Greek word that is used in reference to the Trinity.  John is the one who uses the term, both in his Gospel and in his epistles.  Starting from Chapter 14 of his Gospel, we learn that the paraclete is the Holy Spirit.  The ESV translation is Helper.  Next in Chapter 15, the Holy Spirit is the Spirit of Truth, who bears witness about Jesus.  Next in Chapter 16, once again, the Holy Spirit is both the Helper and the Spirit of Truth.  What is interesting at this point is a look at 1 John 2:1, in which John implies that Jesus was the first paraclete and now the Holy Spirit is the second from John 14:16 again, the difference is that now the paraclete is the Advocate.  Acts 1:5,8 talk about Witnessing to Jesus, while Acts 2:38 brings up an interesting point that I will come back and examine at the end.

So, the Paraclete is the Advocate, the Helper, Spirit of Truth, who bears witness about Jesus.  The Paraclete is both Jesus and the Holy Spirit, about whom the intertwining of references concerning judgment persist into John’s Revelations.  Jesus is our only Mediator and Advocate.  And He sends the Holy Spirit to witness about Himself.  The Paraclete is then God, the generous and merciful God who has provided the solution to our eternal damnation through Himself in His three persons.

And finally, what is this “gift of the Holy Spirit” that Luke records Peter dispensing, based upon faith?  Let’s break down that theologically dense passage.  Peter’s words as translated in the ESV are: “Repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins, and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. 39 For the promise is for you and for your children and for all who are far off, everyone whom the Lord our God calls to himself.” This is the theology of Peter as clearly stated as it gets.  The first part is repentance.  We must turn away from our sin.  We know that this is not possible without the Helper, but Peter weaves this into the passage at the end.  The next part is to be baptized in the name of Jesus.  The reason to be baptized is to receive forgiveness of your sins.  How this is done is in the name of Jesus.  Jews knew that only God forgives sin; therefore, Peter is publically committing blasphemy in the eyes of the Pharisees.  Something must have happened to turn this once coward into such a bold proclaimer of Jesus. 

The next part is that such persons who repent and are baptized will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.  There are at least two levels of looking at this phrase.  The gift might be something that the Holy Spirit gives these people such as the ability to do the first two parts, or it might be the indwelling of the Holy Spirit itself as the seal of this belief.  I would argue that it is both and I think scripture supports this view.

In the second sentence, Peter talks about the Promise.  This is referring to the promise of God to Abraham.  It is a direct reference that would have not gone missing to his Jewish audience.  What is different is how Peter will interpret the phrase “all who are far off” in just a few chapters hence.  Everyone whom the Lord calls to Himself is a lot larger group than the Apostles originally realized.  Peter and Paul are the ones who figure this out.  James confirms it.

And so in summary, the Trinity is a central doctrine of the church.  Our God is of one essence in three persons, all inseparable and yet distinct.  Their roles are clearly different, and yet they overlap somewhat in their unfolding the drama of redemptive history for us.  The Bible is the story of the greatest rescue mission of all time.  It is the story in which we are saved from eternal damnation.  The writers, producers, actors and directors are all the persons of the Trinity.  The audience is humanity.  But some of the audience will receive a back stage pass to meet and greet the company of hosts in heaven.

--Troll--

The Heretics: Arius

The Arian heresy is credited to Arius, a fourth century bishop in Egypt.  Please take note that this is not the same as Hitler’s Aryan, by spelling or meaning.  The true origin of this heresy may be Lucien of Antioch, but the origin is less an issue in this century than the content of the heresy and the response of the rest of the church to it.  The importance of this whole controversy is that it lead to Emperor Constantine convening a council to address this problem at Nicaea, the result of which council was the Nicene Creed.  Some 50 years later, the Nicene Creed was finalized at the First Council of Constantinople (Second Ecumenical Council.)  The whole of the fourth century is punctuated by this debate.  This is a great outline of the events, although difficult to follow without a score card, and isn’t necessary for the discussion, but I include it for completeness.

The major issue of the Arian controversy was the substance of Christ.  Although all of Arius’ writings have been destroyed, his legacy is clear from the arguments against him.  There are two main points in his discussion.  First, the Father is eternal, but Christ is not.  Arius argued that Jesus was the Son of God, and therefore the first creation of God.  Secondly, and as a logical corollary, Jesus was neither fully God nor fully man.  The counterargument here is the doctrine of the Trinity, which was not completely spelled out until the Second Ecumenical Council.  The doctrine of the Trinity is that all three parts of the Godhead, the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit are both all of the same substance and all eternal.  Let’s look at each component of this more closely.

Arius argued that belief that Jesus was both God and Man meant that there must be two Gods.  Therefore, there must have been a time when there was only one God, and Jesus was his first creation.  All the rest of creation was accomplished through Jesus.  Therefore, Jesus was not fully God, in the sense that he was a creation, and therefore less than God.  Verses sighted to confirm this belief include John 14:28 and Colossians 1:15.  

In the John selection, Jesus says, “…the Father is greater than I.” What did He mean by that statement in that context?  The argument here is in terms of authority or leadership, not of substance.  While Jesus is still on the earth and in His earthly body, in some sense He is under the authority of the Law, that is, the Word of God.  Even if Jesus is participant author of the Word with God, while He is man, He is under the Law, and therefore, for a time, under the authority of God.  Look at John 1:1-4, 10:30 and 20:28.  In the first passage, John states that the Word, or Christ, is with God from the beginning.  Even though we can say that Arius agrees with Trinitarians on creation being through Christ, it is clear that John states that Christ was always there with God.  In the second selection, Jesus clearly states, “I and the Father are One.” This cannot be stated any more clearly.  And finally, Thomas, upon his personal revelation of the arisen Christ states that Jesus is God.  It is difficult to argue, therefore, from the context of John that Jesus Christ is anything less than God, both in substance and eternity.

In the Colossians selection, Paul says that Jesus is the firstborn of creation.  The Old Testament reference for this passage is Proverbs 8, which is about wisdom.  Paul is equating Christ with wisdom, but at the same time, he is not making a statement about Christ’s order in creation as supposed by Arius.  It is the concept of wisdom that is the firstborn creation.  In verse 16, the crux of the argument is that by Him all things were created.  How can He be a created thing if all things were created by Him, through Him or in Him?  

While there is the temptation to leave the argument there, there is another issue that comes from the preceding paragraph in Colossians.  There is ample precedent in the New Testament for the notion that Jesus is the firstborn of the New Covenant, the New Creation, the Kingdom of the resurrected world.  Since all of creation will be resurrected, including the rocks, dirt and trees, the notion of Jesus being the firstborn of the New Creation of the New Covenant is certainly true.  Whether Paul is intending this sort of double entendre in Colossians is questionable, but given the order of the letters, Romans is thought to be five years older than Colossians, and the circulation of these letters throughout the ancient world, it is certainly possible that Romans should be treated as an antecedent to the Colossian epistle.  Verse 14 clearly introduces the Kingdom of the Age to Come to the debate and frames the comments in the next few verses.

In the Second Ecumenical Council, it was made clear in the amendment to the Nicene Creed that Father, Son and Holy Spirit are all of the same substance, and all three are one.  This is the doctrine of the Trinity.  Each part of the Trinity is of the same substance, that is God, and each part is only a part of the whole that is God.  As I have mentioned before, all of the Churches of the last 2000 years, whether Orthodex, Roman or Protestant, have shared this Trinitarian view of God.  Despite this, there has always been a thread of this Arian heresy in the theological debate.

There are two very visible and very prominent groups in the US today who persist with some form of the Arian heresy.  They have other issues as well, but clearly this is a part of their problem.  The first group is the Mormons.  The Mormons view Jesus as the physical son of god the father and his goddess wife.  The rest of their theology is not my intent here.  The point here is the clear difference in the idea that Jesus is of the same substance with God with both the Arian view and the Mormon view.  The second group is the Jehovah’s Witnesses.  They actually add the word “other” to the Colossians passage above to make clear that Jesus was the first creation, and then Jesus created every “other” creature.  They view Jesus as the human manifestation of the archangel Michael, that they are the same creature or being.

What is also abundantly clear in both of these examples is that neither group believes in the Reformation doctrine of Sola Scriptura.  This is a powerful argument for this central reformed doctrine.  The Mormons have added a second book, the Book of Mormon, to the scripture.  In fact, this second book is used to interpret the Bible.  This is clearly at odds with Christianity in general and the Protestant Reformation in particular.  It underscores the dangers of the interpretive powers of the Papacy and the manners in which that bad precedent can be corrupted.  The JWs have a second book as well, anything published by the Watch Tower Society as well as their old version of the Bible called the New World Translation.  This translation changes many key passages in the Bible to suit the JW interpretive grid.

Other movements that have some element of Arianism in their thoughts are anything written by Dan Brown and, of course, the Gnostics.  The Gnostics have a full set of beliefs that, again, is outside of this effort, but central among these beliefs is the Arian view of a first-created mediator and secondary creator.  The Gnostic Gospels are thought to be from the third century.  Scholarship that has attempted to tie them to first century Apostles has not been upheld.  The reason for these documents to carry the names of Apostles is to try to give them theological weight that they would clearly lack otherwise.  The authorship in terms of person and timeframe alone would put off inclusion in the canon, if it were not for severe breaks in Christian theology. 

Of particular interest today is the Egyptian situation concerning the Coptic Christians.  The documents found in the library at Nag Mammadi in 1945 were written in the Coptic language.  When the Coptic Christians were excommunicated in 451, it was over the issue of Arianism.  Of note, Origen, who spoke for the Trinity in the fourth century, was also Egyptian, thus it can be said that the Egyptian legacy is not all Arian.  

And finally, words that are used in liberal church circles today smack of the Arian heresy.  Jesus Christ as an example is just such a point.  The so-called Free Grace Movement asserts that a person can accept Christ as Savior, without making him lord of your life.  This notion that seems so foreign to Christian theology has gained much tread in American Evangelical circles.  The idea of Jesus as example of righteous living guts the Gospel of any real significance.  Is the resurrection really necessary to offer us a great example?  Theologically, these types of movements have only one possible endpoint, and that is a denial of Christ as divine.

In summary, the Arian heresy is alive and well today.  It is important as Christians that we recognize it when we hear it.  We need to understand that this heresy was completely refuted in the early church, and has been refuted by all truly Christian theologians since that time.  The divinity of Christ is central to Christian theology.  The denial of Christ’s divinity is equivalent to the denial of Christ’s offer of Salvation.

--Ogre--